Could a game with 100% gear progression and 0% level progression work?

Just as it asks in the title, could a game where the only way to progress is by getting better/different gear work? Most themepark MMOs are already like this at end-game, and recently some games have started allowing players to skip the levelling process entirely, so would there be any issue for players who enjoy that sort of game if levelling were just removed entirely?

Comments

I think we could already argue that leveling doesn't really affecting any game anyway, so I think this is almost in place. Your total gameplay should generally be at end game, and leveling doesn't take long enough to remember it vividly.

Most modern MMOs make character leveling super short these days and focus on a gear ladder so its pretty much that right now. This would have been an interesting conversation back in the early 2000s, but nowadays it would work and is almost what we have.

If you think about World of Warcraft and how being higher level makes you a god compared to lower level enemies even if you were naked and wielding a plain stick in your hands it should be obvious to everyone that something is wrong in the picture.

Now think of the same picture with no levels and you wearing a powerful set of gear. At even level you're no more an immortal, while still having an upper hand against several enemies in more inferior gear.

Next step would be to scale all your skills and abilities with your gear, so that players with bigger stats would make more damage and have more endurance instead of rank x spell you get on level y, that makes 100% more damage than rank x-1 spell.

Levels in these mainstream MMOs is the mechanic that makes everything else but the endgame meaningless, and that is the one we have to get rid of as soon as possible.

If you want my honest opinion, progression is progression, no matter what you label it. So in essence, just because an MMO has level progression, you have people that automatically assume the only thing worth doing is end-game content. Too many people think all that matters is racing to the end, skipping content, skipping lore and stories. So in reality, what you want has nothing to do with RPG. Which is what most level progression MMOs are based on. I really don't see how grinding for end-game gear is any more enjoyable then the adventure to get to that point.

If UO did it was after I left... which was shortly after all the volunteer programs closed down. (I was on the Interest team).

When I did play UO it didn't really have any gear progression to speak of. There were PVP players that would pay stupid amounts of money for certain weapons or armor... but in all the PVP that I did.. my crafted stuff worked as well.

My "problem" with MMO's as an example is not whether they are gear based or level based. It's the fact that almost all of them go Raid "end game" and that is why crafting is useless. Or they get the bright idea to lock crafting related stuff inside raids...

The games *I* enjoy most more or less have a player economy and the "end game' just revols around which game you play inside the game... Crafter, Harvester, Hunter or a combination of those. Or with a game like SWG you also had the various Entertainer "mini games" inside the game. I never ran out of things to do... yet in every Raid end game MMO... I get bored quite quickly.

To be perfectly honest games like WoW where the only thing your level decides is what content you can see or how long skills are locked out are already kinda like that. You could remove the levels all together from that game lately and it would be the same. The person with the best gear wins 99% of the time. You can have a person that barely can play take down things or other people just because they have better gear point blank. So in reality yeah it could work but not something I really want to play because if you take a break from that type of game you pretty much never will catch back up unless you play 24-7.

I can't stand gear progression and levels are made super simple via linear questing.I had a choice gear progression would be eliminated before levels,that is how much i despise it.

Your efficiency/ability as a player should be via your abilities/spells/choices,NOT so much weighted towards gear.

However most gamer's seem to be superficial rpg players,they tend to only care about gear and nothing else that is role playing.I don't mind gear,sure it is fun for everyone to attain gear,but it should not be the deciding factor when doing content.It should also NOT be attained through constant instances and Bosses.There is a simple template that devs keep using,they put no thought into their choices,they instead just keep making common systems to attain levels and gear ,the games do NOT operate like a role playing game but more like a treadmill.

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The Secret World originally was gear progression based. It didnt have levels, it had QL levels based on your gear.

The Secret World is dead now and replaced by Secret World Legends which is level based.

For an MMO, having progression based entirely on your gear means that itis based on gear drops which is random, so progression would be based on RNG. People already hate RNG enough.

It works for non-MMOs like Monster Hunter.

TSW always had a hidden character level (averaged from your ranks in talisman & weapon scores, which ranks in turn determined the highest gear QL you could equip), and the only "level" anyone in SWL cares about is "item power" (because "equipment potential estimated equivalance number" would take up too much space on screen) i.e. gear score, maximum character level is typically reached midway through the second region).

Yes it would work but I don't see any difference compare to level based progression.

Your first gear is +1, to get a +2 gear set you need to do +2 dungeons and to get +3 gear set you need to do +3 dungeons in your +2 set because if you have your +1 set you will get one shotted..

Later in game you have +15 set with 4 different stats, you need your +15 set to do a +15 dungeon to get your 5th stat so you can do that epic ++16 raid.

Well if it would be a theme based MMO that is.

If it were a sandbox setting you need to progress skills to enhance your character and better gear and you need different skills to be unlocked via quests, guilds, time, money or whatever to obtain better gear, or you can throw out skills altogether and just get better gear via grinding mobs for gold and gear all day long, perhaps quests also but some quests you still need better gear or you die horrible.

In my day MMORPG's were so hard we fought our way through dungeons in the snow, uphill both ways.

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Yes it would work but I don't see any difference compare to level based progression.

Your first gear is +1, to get a +2 gear set you need to do +2 dungeons and to get +3 gear set you need to do +3 dungeons in your +2 set because if you have your +1 set you will get one shotted..

Later in game you have +15 set with 4 different stats, you need your +15 set to do a +15 dungeon to get your 5th stat so you can do that epic ++16 raid.

Well if it would be a theme based MMO that is.

If it were a sandbox setting you need to progress skills to enhance your character and better gear and you need different skills to be unlocked via quests, guilds, time, money or whatever to obtain better gear, or you can throw out skills altogether and just get better gear via grinding mobs for gold and gear all day long, perhaps quests also but some quests you still need better gear or you die horrible.

What you just described here was the gear based progression, and that's the way it should be in my opinion.

In level based progression you could get the +1 gear set and then grind some easy content until you out level both +2 and +3 gear set and are ready to get the +4 gear set.

That's why the end game is the only part that usually matters - you can't out level content anymore, and the progression becomes gear based only.